


The Unspoken Words

by OnceUponaSwanQueen



Category: NCIS
Genre: F/M, Post Season 5
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-25
Updated: 2014-03-25
Packaged: 2018-01-16 23:45:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1366162
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OnceUponaSwanQueen/pseuds/OnceUponaSwanQueen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A year after Judgment Day, Gibbs finally tells Jenny the words she always wanted to hear.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Unspoken Words

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written in 2009 for the prompt "Regret".

Gibbs kneeled down on Jenny’s grave. It had been a year, a year since he had walked into the cabin and seen her blood all over the floor, but couldn’t react like he wanted to because of Leon.

It’s been a whole year since he had lost her, lost her for good this time.  Gibbs didn’t do this, he didn’t regret.  He hadn’t done that since Shannon and Kelly died. He had been numb for years after that had happened. Jenny had been the one that had gotten his fire back into his soul.

Sure, he had been married to Diane when he met her, when she was assigned as his probie, but Diane had been a bad attempt at trying to forget them. An attempt that hadn’t worked, he pained just as much, even if he had a hot redhead in his bed. 

With Jenny it had been different, oh, so different. She had challenged him like no one had done before, she certainly didn’t put up with his crap. She knew she was just as good as him, and she was determined to prove that. It was no wonder he had fallen for her.

He knew Jenny Shepard would be a problem the moment he saw her in the director’s office, with high heels and a suit that really showed off her body. He just didn’t know what kind of problem she would be.

“Hi, Jen.” He said to her grave.

He felt a tear fall down his cheek that he quickly wiped away.

“You shouldn’t be here!”

And it was true, he should have been able to protect her, he should have been  _there._

“Why didn’t you come to me, Jen? Why?”

Sure, it had stopped being his job to protect her 11 years ago when she had chosen her career over him, and Gibbs didn’t blame her. Why should she have chosen her? He never told her...

Not even in Paris, not even...             

 

_ “Jethro!”  It sounded like her voice was breaking, she was full of fear. _

_ “Jen!” Gibbs shouted out, he needed to see her, see that she was safe. _

_ Jenny walked around the corner and when she saw Gibbs there, it looked like the weight of the world had been removed for her shoulders, even if they still were in the middle of their most dangerous undercover op ever. _

_ “Jethro” she said as she threw his arms around him, smelling his scent. _

_ Gibbs kissed Jenny carefully on the lips to make her understand that he was there, and that he was okay, they gunshots had missed and he was okay. Jenny had other ideas thought and turned what was an innocent kiss of comfort into something more. _

_ It was like she had to drink in his life, like her own life depends on it, and that scared Gibbs. No one had ever been that depended on him, not since Shannon, since Kelly. And that scared him. Jenny was making him feel things he hadn’t felt since they were alive. _

_ Jenny was starting to become as important to him as Shannon had been and he hadn’t thought that was possible. But then again, there were a lot of things he hadn’t thought possible before he had met Jenny, and now, suddenly they all were possible. _

_ Jenny had taught him how to laugh again, how to smile, has to feel. _

_ “Hey, Jen.” Jethro said carefully, as he broke away from the kiss. “Hey, everything is okay. I’m okay. The shooters missed.” _

_ Jethro knew it was wrong to care so much about a partner, knowing what would happen if he... _

_ No, he didn’t want to think that way. Jenny was a damn good agent, she could care for herself. _

_ “I don’t know what I would do if I lost you, Jethro.” Jenny confessed, and Gibbs wiped the tear that came down her cheek away. _

_ “Hey, I’m not going anywhere, Jen” he said, and kissed her reassuringly. _

_ “I love you, Jethro” Jenny said when the kiss ended. _

_ Gibbs knew it was true, yet his answer was “That’ll be the day” _

_ And before Jenny had the chance to react to his words, they heard gunfire again, and suddenly they weren’t Jenny and Jethro anymore, they were agents with a job to do. _

_ It was also the last time they ever really were Jenny and Jethro. _

 

“Why couldn’t I say those words to you, Jen? Why was it so hard?”

Gibbs closed his eyes, and he could still see her face smiling to him, looking as happy as she had the first time they kissed, with the same glow.

Gibbs knew she would always be with him, just like Shannon and Kelly.

“You know, you were the first person I opened up to after Shannon and Kelly died, you were the first person I let see the real me. You changed so much, Jen, and I never told you.”

The tears were getting stronger, and Gibbs had stopped caring. The only one that could hear him was six feet under.

Everything that had happened since Paris, everything that had happened before Paris. He knew he could never forget.

The pain was still there, the pain of leaving her at that airport, the pain of not seeing her for so long. The feelings that came back when he saw her again in MTAC. The revelation to himself that the feelings were still there. And the way she could still make his heart flutter just by saying his name.

That’s when he knew, that’s when he realized what a fool he had been in Paris, that’s when he realized that it had been real. All of it. That was when he realized that other than Shannon, Jenny had been the only woman he had ever loved.

“I love you, Jen. And I wish I had had the guts to tell you when you were alive. I don’t know if it had made I difference...”

“She knew, Jethro, she knew”

“Duck?”  Gibbs turned around and saw him.

“She told me, what happened in Paris, she told me.”

“I should have told her, Duck, I should’ve.”¨

“It doesn’t matter if you did or not, she knew,”

Gibbs nodded; it was a small comfort to know.

“Come, we have a dead petty officer in Norfolk.”

Gibbs got up on his feet again, “I’m coming.” He said to Ducky before looking down on the grave.

“I miss you, Jen .”


End file.
